Ballots and Fence Rails: Reconstruction on the Lower Cape Fear

Ballots and Fence Rails recounts the struggle to reshape the post-Civil War society of the lower Cape Fear River in North Carolina, the Confederacy's last outlet to the sea. Focusing on events in the port city of Wilmington and its rural environs, William McKee Evans ranges in time from the region's occupation by Union forces in 1865 to the end of Reconstruction in 1877.
Evans shows that although social change was sought at the ballot box, it was just as often resisted in the streets, with one faction armed with pistols and sabres and another, at one point, armed mostly with fence rails. Drawing on his extensive knowledge of the region, Evans dramatically portrays the conflict as it was viewed by former slaves, southern conservatives, carpetbaggers, and scalawags. Evans also clarifies many generalizations about Reconstruction that are often empty or unsubstantiated, showing that the right to vote cannot alone diffuse political power and that Reconstruction at the local level often differed from Reconstruction at the state level.

William McKee Evans is a professor of history emeritus at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona.